The Ice Age Trail Alliance Celebrates Its Land Protection and Trailbuilding Legacy.
Cross Plains, WI (January, 2018) – Turning 60 is a big deal if you are the one blowing out the candles or if you’re a trail organization. The Ice Age Trail Alliance grew up alongside some memorable events of our nation: from the first man to walk on the moon to the first woman on the Supreme Court bench; from ending the Cold War to electing our first black president. However, we’re not looking in the rear view mirror. We’re firmly focused on the future where the Ice Age Trail will continue to play a vital role as centering touchstone in the lives of Wisconsinites and the wider hiking world.
The Ice Age National Scenic Trail offers outdoor enthusiasts a world-class hiking experience with its unique landscape story. The telling of it naturally unfolds as the Ice Age Trail follows formations left in the wake of a receding glacier. Hikers essentially travel back in time as they encounter enormous erratics, walk on top of eskers, and pause at glittering kettle lakes.
The Trail provides one of the last wild hiking experiences on an untrammeled path. Remote Northwood segments, especially, offer a surplus of solitude where hikers can truly disconnect from a rushed, busy life and reconnect to awe, wonder, and silence. The hushed forests, which buffer the 2-foot-wide Trail from civilization, are courtesy of a thoughtful legacy of land protection.
Land protection and management is another point of distinction for the Ice Age Trail Alliance, the organization charged with creating, maintaining, and supporting the Ice Age Trail. It achieved, in 2014, a coveted status as an accredited land trust awarded through the Land Trust Alliance Accreditation Commission. Accreditation ensures the Alliance can conduct proper land transactions and have the resources in place to maintain and protect the land it purchases.
20,455 acres have been purchased in the last 60 years and now 128 miles of Trail is permanently protected in an otherwise shrinking wilderness landscape. “The distinctive aesthetic of the hiker experience is heightened by prairie restoration work on Alliance-owned land,” points out Kevin Thusius, Director of Land Conservation for the Alliance. “Removal of non-fire tolerant trees and shrubs allow for future prescribed broadcast burns which allow remnant prairies to flourish and tell the land’s story of pre-settlement days.”
To ensure another 60 years and beyond for the Trail, the Alliance is taking more responsibility for sharing the personal benefits of the Trail with new audiences through initiatives like these:
Trailtessa Retreats, an initiative spurred by grant funding from REI’s Force of Nature initiative, are focused on engaging multi-generational women and girls in themed day-hikes and outings. Immersive experiences create opportunities for women to push their personal limits.
Service Learning experiences on the Trail help shape tomorrow’s leaders by giving youth ages 4 to 24 opportunities to develop a conservation ethic, give back to their communities, and work alongside community mentors, including local and state political leaders. In doing so, they restore the landscape, create stone steps, or install signage that is critical to the next person on the path.
Saunters is dedicated to combating “nature deficit disorder” by taking youth on hikes along the Ice Age while infusing the experience with core curriculum concepts. Saunters is based on the idea that if youth are immersed in natural settings they will learn experientially, naturally, and collaboratively while navigating the glacial landscape on foot. While this is the core belief of Saunters, it applies to all Trail users and helps guide the work of the Alliance towards the next 60 years.
Visit booth 20481-SL today. Celebrate with us and begin planning your hike on the IAT.
OR Show contact: Luke Kloberdanz, IATA Director of Philanthropy, 608-206-3086
Contact: Lysianne Unruh, Communications Coordinator, 608-798-4453, ext. 228
##
The Ice Age Trail Alliance is a non-profit volunteer and member-based organization established in 1958 that works to create, support, and protect the Ice Age Trail. Visit www.iceagetrail.org for hiking information and volunteer opportunities.
